Three barriers to participation in regular exercise include; injury, cost and lack of time.

Injury:
Injury can be annoying when trying to participate in exercise as it doesn’t allow you to participate at your full potential. Injury can be overcome by rest and physiotherapy. But if you still want to participate in regular exercise there are a few ways to overcome it; you could exercise other parts of your body for example if you have a injured ankle you could lift weights, punch a punching bag while sitting down, push ups etc. Depending on the severity of the injury there are different methods to overcome it. For example if you have a little pain in the knee you can wear a knee brace to give the knee more support and hopefully reduce the pain, giving you a chance to exercise.

Cost:
The ability to afford to join a fitness centre or sporting club, and buy fitness products, or buy exercise clothing and shoes can be a very big barrier to participating in regular exercise. Lack of money can restrict the range and types of activities available. There are a few ways you can exercise when having money shortages, these are; going for a jog by yourself or getting some friends to go for a jog with you; walk or ride to the shops and work; lookout for deals that gyms have that suit your budget (e.g. buy 1yr membership now get 1 free); you could also round up some friends and have a game of football, league, netball etc. at the local park and have it on a weekly basis.

Lack of time:
Many commitments such as work and raising a family can leave you with a lack of time to participate in regular exercise. It’s not uncommon for parents to become spectators as their children grow and begin to participate in activity and rather than joining in. They can become more active by increasing their incidental activities such as doing the housework more vigorously, walking the kids to and from school, make a schedule of you week and find out when you have free time to then go and exercise.